theastrophysicist

Not that I can read Japanese or anything, but this looks exactly like what Professor Itai Cohen worked/is working on. Disclaimer: I have not worked with him, so I don’t know any details.

From what I recall from a talk he gave last semester, he takes 3-D videos of them to study their flight (one can easily see why this is useful). That isn’t all though: he attaches small magnets to them, and while they are flying around peacefully, he turns on a magnet to give them a kick, disorienting them suddenly. What he wants to do is examine how the fruit flies reorient themselves properly to maintain their flight.

Possible application: mechanical bees that keep flying through explosions to disorient them. Deadly.

soresore:

研究ではさらに、ハエの動きと空気力学をシミュレートするコンピューターモデルを用いた分析が行なわれ、ハエの翅と体の接合部が、トーション(ねじり)ばねのような働きをすることが明らかになった。トーションばねは、ぜんまい仕掛けのおもちゃや、昔の時計に用いられているタイプのバネだ。ハエは、この「バネ」を制御する筋肉をわずかに動かすだけで、翅の傾斜角度を変え、方向転換を発動させることができるという。